Influence of friction and asymmetric freeplay on the limit cycle oscillation in aeroelastic system: An extended Hénon’s technique to temporal integration

Nonlinear effects such as friction and freeplay on the control surfaces can affect aeroelastic dynamics during flight. In particular, these nonlinearities can induce limit cycle oscillations (LCO), changing the system stability, and because of this it is essential to employ computational methods to predict this type of motion during the aircraft development cycle. In this context, the present article presents a matrix notation for describing the Hénon’s method used to reduce errors when considering piecewise linear nonlinearities in the numerical integration process. In addition, a new coordinate system is used to write the aeroelastic system of equations. The proposal defines a displacement vector with generalized and physical variables to simplify the computational implementation of the Hénon’s technique. Additionally, the article discusses the influence of asymmetric freeplay and friction on the LCO of an airfoil with control surface. The results show that the extended Hénon’s technique provides more accurate LCO predictions, that friction can change the frequency and amplitude of these motions, and the asymmetry of freeplay is important to determine the LCO behavior.